ICICI Bank launches India’s first contactless credit and debit cards

India’s largest private sector bank Industrial Credit and Investment Corporation of India (ICICI) Bank has launched country’s first ‘contactless’ debit and credit cards.
These cards will provide its customers to make electronic payments by waving the cards near the merchant terminal instead of dipping or swiping.

Facts about ICICI Bank’s contactless cards

• These cards are based on the Near Field Communication (NFC) technology and powered by MasterCard contactless and Visa payWave technologies.
• It provide customers with the improved convenience of speed as these cards require significantly less time than traditional cards to complete a transaction.
• It also enhances security features for the customer.

Presently, bank has introduced these cards in cities like Gurgaon, Hyderabad and Mumbai. ICICI Bank also has provided with over 1200 Electronic Data Capture (EDC) machines that are capable of accepting contactless payments in these cities.

ICICI Bank Launches Digital Village Project in Akodara Village of Gujarat

Industrial Credit and Investment Corporation of India (ICICI) Bank has launched its own version of Digital Village Project by adopting entire Akodara Village in Sabarkantha district of Gujarat.
It was launched presence of Prime Minister Narendra Modi and ICICI Bank MD and CEO Chanda Kochar to mark 60-year-celebration of the ICICI group’s existence.

Key facts about ICICI Bank’s Digital Village Project

• It is launched in lines with Governments flagship programme of Digital India.
• It seeks to provide entire village with services ranging from cashless banking to digitised school teaching.
• As part of this project, banking platform at rural part will be digitized by covering all aspects of banking like opening an account to sale of goods to purchase of products including milk from the vendors or local kirana stores.
• In case of school teaching, it will digitized all school records alongwith the Gujarat syllabus and even teaching methods and tools.
• It will also provide necessary infrastructure needed for digisiting entire village in order to provide villager with the access required to data and information in a digital format.
• Besides basic banking facilities like ATMs and other digital banking services, other services like e-health, e-milk producer group, Wi-Fi connectivity and schools with digital black boards in the village, along with a host of other digital facilities will be provided under this project.

About ICICI Bank

It was established in 1955 as ICICI Ltd.

Originally it was set up as an Indian financial institution as the initiative of the World Bank, the Government of India and representatives of Indian industry to provide project financing to Indian businesses.

Later in 1994, it got merged to form ICICI Bank.

NITI Aayog

NITI Aayog or National Institution for Transforming India Aayog is a policy think-tank of Union Government of India that replaces Planning Commission of India and aims to involve the states in economic policy-making in India. It will be providing strategic and technical advice to the central and the state governments. Prime Minister of India heads the Aayog as its chairperson.

Union Government of India had announced formation of NITI Aayog on 1 January 2015

Genesis

• 1950 : Planning commission was established
• May 29, 2014 : The first IEO(Independent Evaluation Office ) assessment report was submitted to Prime Minister Modi on May 29, three days after he was sworn in. According to Ajay Chibber, who heads the IEO, views in the report are based on the views of stakeholders and some Planning Commission members themselves. Planning Commission to be replaced by "control commission"
• August 13, 2014: Cabinet of Modi govt. scrapped the Planning Commission
• Aug. 15 2014: Modi mentioned to replace Planning Commission by National Development and Reform Commission(NDRC) on the line of China.

Present Members

The various members of NITI Aayog are:

• Chairperson: Prime Minister Narendra Modi
• CEO Sindhushree Khullar
• Vice Chairperson: Arvind Panagariya
• Ex-Officio Members: Rajnath Singh, Arun Jaitley, Suresh Prabhu and Radha Mohan Singh
• Special Invitees: Nitin Gadkari, Smriti Zubin Irani and Thawar Chand Gehlot
• Full-time Members: Bibek Debroy & V. K. Saraswat
• Governing Council: All Chief Ministers and Lieutenant Governors of Union Territories

CIBIL : Credit Information Bureau (India) Limited

Credit Information Bureau (India) Limited or CIBIL is a Credit Information Company (CIC) founded in August 2000. Post Inception, we have come to play a critical role in India’s financial system. Whether it is to help loan providers manage their business or help consumers secure credit faster and at better terms, the use of CIBIL’s products have led to a massive change in the way the credit life cycle is managed by both loan providers and consumers.

Shareholding Pattern of CIBIL

• TransUnion International Inc 55%
• ICICI Bank Ltd 10%
• State Bank of India 10%
• Indian Overseas Bank 5%
• The Hongkong and Shanghai Banking Corporation 5%
• Union Bank of India 5%
• Bank of India 5%
• Bank of Baroda 5%

 How CIBIL Works

CIBIL collects and maintains records of an individual‘s payments pertaining to loans and credit cards. These records are submitted to CIBIL by banks and other lenders, on a monthly basis. This information is then used to create Credit Information Reports (CIR) and credit scores which are provided to lenders in order to help evaluate and approve loan applications.

CIBIL empowers both loan providers and individuals to see their world more clearly and hence, take better and more informed decisions.

NABARD : National Bank for Agriculture and Rural Development

National Bank for Agriculture and Rural Development (NABARD) is an apex development bank in India having headquarters based in Mumbai (Maharashtra). The Committee to Review Arrangements for Institutional Credit for Agriculture and Rural Development (CRAFICARD), set up by the Reserve Bank of India (RBI) under the Chairmanship of Shri B. Sivaraman, conceived and recommended the establishment of the National Bank for Agriculture and Rural Development (NABARD). It was established on 12 July 1982 by a special act by the parliament and its main focus was to uplift rural India by increasing the credit flow for elevation of agriculture & rural non farm sector and completed its 25 years on 12 July 2007.  RBI sold its stake in NABARD to the Government of India, which now holds 99% stake. NABARD is active in developing financial inclusion policy and is a member of the Alliance for Financial Inclusion.

NABARD was established on the recommendations of Shivaraman Committee. It replaced the Agricultural Credit Department (ACD) and Rural Planning and Credit Cell (RPCC) of Reserve Bank of India, and Agricultural Refinance and Development Corporation (ARDC). It is one of the premier agencies to provide credit in rural areas. NABARD is India's specialised bank for Agriculture and Rural Development in India. The initial capital of NABARD was Rs. 100 crore. As on 31 March 2014, NABARD paid up capital stood at Rs. 4700 crore (Rs. 4680 Crore of GoI and Rs. 20 Crore of RBI.

Organisation Stucture:

Role of NABARD

NABARD is the apex institution in the country which looks after the development of the cottage industry, small industry and village industry, and other rural industries. NABARD also reaches out to allied economies and supports and promotes integrated development. And to help NABARD discharge its duty, it has been given certain roles as follows:

1. Serves as an apex financing agency for the institutions providing investment and production credit for promoting the various developmental activities in rural areas
2. Takes measures towards institution building for improving absorptive capacity of the credit delivery system, including monitoring, formulation of rehabilitation schemes, restructuring of credit institutions, training of personnel, etc.
3. Co-ordinates the rural financing activities of all institutions engaged in developmental work at the field level and maintains liaison with Government of India, State Governments, Reserve Bank of India (RBI) and other national level institutions concerned with policy formulation
4. Undertakes monitoring and evaluation of projects refinanced by it.
5. NABARD refinances the financial institutions which finances the rural sector.
6. The institutions which help the rural economy, NABARD helps develop.
7. NABARD also keeps a check on its client institutes.
8. It regulates the institution which provides financial help to the rural economy.
9. It provides training facilities to the institutions working in the field of rural upliftment.
10. It regulates the cooperative banks and the RRB's.